Parachuting From Horsa Glider - Airborne Forces Experimental Establishment

I found these fascinating two stills on Rex Picture house website peoples, unknown, parachuting from a Horsa glider in mid tow, which was photographed by Keith Medley part of the Airborne Forces Experimental Establishment.

I assume this was photographed at Sherburn-in-Elmet, but I can't think why you would want to drop men by parachute from a glider.

Brithm

http://www.paradata.org.uk/units/airborne-forces-experimental-establishment

 

May be if they were short on aircraft rigged for dropping troops but had an aircraft not suitable to drop troops but powerful enough to tow a glider this might be a compromise.
This of course only needed if DZ unsuitable for landing glider.

 

My attention was first drawn to this a few years ago by Paul Hendriks the owner of the glider museum at Wolfheze. He showed me a construction in the wings of the Horsa which was designed to carry containers. He said that this was not a later adaptation but something which had been included in the plans from the outset. As there was no need to drop containers from a glider that was about to land the only reason for it would be to drop containers in support of parachutists.
I did quite a bit of research and found records of trials of dropping parachutists, including the seating plans, adaptation for strops etc which showed that the Horsa could carry about 20 parachutists. Exiting through the front and rear exits obviously had to be coordinated in order to maintain the centre of gravity of the glider. Additional trials were also conducted for the resupply of panniers etc from gliders, once again coordinated through the front and rear exits.
I was unable to identify any occasions when this happened in action.
The photo shows a trial in 1944 with 15 men dropped with 6 containers

John

 

It was a revelation to me when you guys went into the details of jumping from gliders in this thread as well:

http://ww2talk.com/forums/topic/54416-sterling-bomberpara/

Curiously I was just tripping around British Pathe when I came across the following video which beginning at 46 seconds shows a triple descent from two towed Wacos and the tug as well. It looks like men are leaving the gliders but it could be just containers, however, it does show one Waco taking off early on with side doors open. The Americans were obviously experimenting along the same lines during the war if the date is correct.

Gliders 1944 - British Pathe

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=5xc_yqsqjws

Regards ...

 

good day cee,m,yesterday,08:07.pm.re:parachuting from a glider.great video.#4 thank you for posting regards bernard85

 

The ability to drop parachutists was written in to the specification for not only the Horsa but also the Hotspur and Hengist gliders, and all three conducted parachuting trials at the AFEE.
Only following the German use of Airborne Forces in 1940 did Britain take the idea up seriously and we started with what was basically a clean sheet of paper and no modern transport aircraft. Luckily the bombers we had had been designed with the idea of the 'bomber transport' in mind which meant they were readily adaptable for parachuting, but only with small numbers of paras. the number of parachutists could be increased by towing gliders with more paras. One original idea was that the gliders would be towed in trains and the Hotspur was tested on a double tow. The Hotspur's compliment of 7 troops plus a pilot was soon seen as too small and the Hengist was specified as a 15 seater but even before that aircraft was built the developing concept of Airborne Forces called for a 25 seater which became the Horsa.

 

Saw this on the Glider Assault Trust facebook page dropping of wicker baskets by parachute from a towed Horsa

https://www.facebook.com/47904435934/videos/10152614326290935/

 

Cee,

Many thanks for the Excellent Video link

Regards
Tom

 

John,

Looking through the Horsa plans on the Assault Glider Trust's Flickr pages I came across these diagrams showing where and how the containers were attached to the wings. Quite interesting.



Regards ...

 

For the containers to be dropped from the wing the main undercarriage had to be jettisoned first as it was in the way. The ability to jettison the gear was also an original requirement in the Horsa's specification - and the reason for the central skid.
For the pannier drops the Horsa was fitted with two tracks of roller conveyor floor and to keep the drop cadence co-ordinated the two tracks were interlinked with a rope and pulley system. As far as I can discover this use of roller floor to despatch stores was a world's first for a method that is stil in use world-wide to this day.

 

At any time were there plans to add an engine or two to the gliders so they could either take off after landing on the LZ or glide towards a target, release their paras and then fly off again unheard by the enemy? I could see the SAS using gliders in this way. Or at least think about using gliders this way.

 

Motorised gliders did exist but mostly to help overloaded gliders and tugs get off the ground especially in the tropics. You will be able to find pictures of the CG4a with podded engines and the Hamilcar X had two Bristol Mercury engines added and was capable of taking off on its own but only when empty. There were even trials of the Hotspur and Horsa with Rocket assist. The germans on the other hand did engine their gliders turning them into transport aircraft.

 

Expanding a bit on what Aeronut wrote, the Hotspur and Horsa RATO trials were pre-trials of adding RATO to the Hamilcar as there were some serious concerns about the early war bombers like the Whitley having enough power to get the glider off the ground. In the end the Halifax and Stirling proved more than powerful enough so it was never needed. The addition of aero engines was seen more of a way of assisting the tugs and getting a little more range which would be especially important if they'd been used in the pacific war against Japan.

Airspeed apparently investigated adding motors to the Horsa but it never went beyond concept sketches or a factory mock-up and was never trialled by the RAF. The Hamilcar was the only British glider which actually got engines as the Hamilcar X and formed the stepping stone to military cargo aircraft like the Beverly.

Point to note - the Hamilcar X could only fly on it's own when unloaded, it didn't have enough power to take-off with a useful military load on it's own and still needed a tug.

 

FP

I couldn't find a clip of the Hamilcar X in flight. It can be see in following video on the ground at the Ata Pageant Air Show (1947) near the beginning at 37 second mark.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=qtPwK-ddOcw

Some photos here at a Russian site:

http://www.airwar.ru/enc/glider/gal58.html



Regards ...

Edit: Fixed link

 

ref Brithm's posted photographs. The AFEE photographers at Sherburn and Beaulieu were Keith Medley (my god father) and Bob Bird, my father, who photographed glider trials, the flying jeep and the captured Achgelis helicopters. In 2004 I published a book Top Secret War Bird of WW11 that contained never before published photographs including that of Robert Kronfeld in RAF uniform and the fatal crash of Albermarle V1762
robin bird

 

Hi Robin,

Very interesting. I noticed your book is currently unavailable on Amazon, so I guess it's a case of picking it up used where ever sold. Ebay is still selling photos from a large collection of AFEE photos (200+). I noticed Amesbury Abby in the background of a few so this may be the Airborne Forces Development Centre (AFDC) arm of the AFEE. Anyway I thought it was a shame they were being sold off piece by piece instead of going to an archive for preservation. An example here:

http://www.ebay.com/itm/WW2-British-Airborne-Para-Training-Area-with-Plane-Original-Negative-122-/361468039656?hash=item54292c91e8:g:LNcAAOSwKtlWjZXW

Regards ...

 

Thanks for the feedback. Top Secret War Bird of WW11 was a self published book that sold out and was written as a tribute to dad shortly after he died. I did not fully realise at the time that so many of his pictures had not been published, likewise from his time at the Marine Aircraft Experimental Establishment. The picture shows Bob front row second left. Next to him is F/0 Pleasants, who like Keith Medley was my godfather. The other shows the darkroom of the MAEE at Beaulieu with photographs of trials on the wall. Unfortunately it is not economical to self publish books these days, so I am currently putting Bob's pictures in the story of RAF Helensburgh MAEE. This I will release as a dvd

 

Thanks RB, fascinating stuff. I imagine your Father's photo department were responsible for a few of wartime photos shown on Paradata.

https://paradata.org.uk/media/34463?mediaSection=Photos

Regards ...

 

Bob was employed by the Ministry of Aircraft Production then assigned to both the Marine Aircraft Experimental Establishment and the Airborne Forces Experimental Establishment. His photographs were used for boffins to study and MAP reports, the latter now part of the National Archives Kew. However, following his death I discovered in his K20 camera box photographs that have never before been published. He flew with Robert Kronfeld, he flew in the prototype Sunderland and in the first Lerwick, he flew in one of the Heinkel 115s and photographed the wreckage of the Achgelis Drache helicopter. Like the rest of his generation I wished dad had spoken more about the war but he was busy as a press photographer

 

RB,

If I have the right one the Fairchild K-20 looks like a bit of a beast. It must have been quite the thrill to discover undeveloped film in your Father's camera.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Fairchild_K-20

Have you considered putting out your book in an ebook format?

Regards ...